Month: February 2012

One of the many facets to human kind is that of perception and the reaction to your own and other people’s perception. That’s all well and good, but the problems resides in the fact that perceptions can be faulty. Now, to be completely immune to society’s damaging effects and even your own negativity is, quite frankly, impossible. Its better to realise and accept that fact and try to work on yourself to avoid situations that lead to misunderstandings.

Personally, I have come across hundreds of situations where the problem’s base were two things: perception and reaction.

When we see someone or some thing, we need to have an immediate image in our head of that thing/person for instant and later reference. Now human mind is such that we don’t just capture the appearance of the thing or person, we also register it’s character, movement, way of talking and general behavioural notes. Like I discussed earlier, people, like animals, need a description on others in order to protect themselves if needed. Even though there is nothing wrong with that, since perceiving is rather natural and you cant really help but let it take place. Albeit, it might be seen as unfair when someone perceives something even though there is not enough legitimate data to make it reality. But nonetheless, people do it anyway. Now, we cant really include people who intentionally perceive/portray things in such a way that it gives an unfair advantage to him/her and an unjust disadvantage to the person concerned as it would make the entire discussion, not impossible, but rather lengthy and complicated.

Now onto the reaction part. Let’s leave off general reaction to things for a while, as that might take ages and a separate blog to cover the whole topic, since its never simply a reaction, there’s all this psychological stuff going on inside our head.
So, then we are left with reactions to our own perceptions and other’s perceptions reeling back to us. Perception is such a thing that you just have no control over immediately, only after the whole act has been committed can we edit other’s and our own perceived imaginings (that is if we’re aware, but that’s besides the point). If, say, I was to perceive that some person wasn’t good at cooking. How would I react? Would I make fun of the person, let him be or completely ignore the idea? Or maybe teach him? If someone had the same idea about me and I knew about it, how would I react to that? Would I slam the said person in denial, try to become better at cooking, explain to him why or just take the hurt and ignore it altogether?

How we react to things contributes more to the person we’ll become than what we think, since actions have tentacles greater than thought, which is private and editable.

Like this:

Its my birthday today, which makes me an Aquarius. I cant help but connect to all the Aquarius’ out there, and feel as if we might have a whole lot more common than we think. One of those things is a detached attachment to all things, people and general life. It may seem that we don’t care at first, but really, we do.

One of the things, rather a living thing, I do love dearly is my cat: Cherie. She’s a Siamese, and a beautiful one at that. Not because of her looks, hell, I think she looks like a damned rat at times.. No, its because of her personality. Now I might sound like a complete lunatic, but hear me out.
Every morning me, and my younger sister, leave Cherie out of our room to do her morning duties to her mammal body. We did the very same this morning, as well. But today, unlike other days, Cherie caught a prey when out on her morning stroll across the garden. She had caught a field rat (which, by the by, are very good looking.. Gray, white, tiny and cute as a button).
In normal circumstances, normal cats would have had that delicious looking rat as their first meal of the day. But no, something snaps in Cherie’s head that she must go inside with the rat dangling from it’s neck-down in her teeth.
My father, sitting in the sitting area across from our bedroom door, reading a copy of Time magazine, hears an odd constrained sound from our doorway. Looking around, he notices that Cherie was making them standing in front of our door for us to open. And then it dawns upon him why she sounded like a dog; he saw a tail, and then a tiny body attached to it, hanging from Cherie’s mouth, as lifeless as a leaf in Autumn (maybe not as light). After registering the fact that, indeed, Cherie had caught a beautiful meal, he rushed towards her to scare her into dropping the rat. Which, of course being a cat, she didn’t do. Instead she gave him a run for his money and settled under a bed to enjoy her meal; the minute she kept it on the ground, he hushed her up from behind and she ran out of the room, leaving her food behind.

Later, it struck Father that he had done a very unfair thing. For, if she had to eat the rat, she wouldn’t have brought it inside.. Instead, she brought it in and outside of our door to share the meal with her clan: me and my sister.

Now tell me, who says cats are heartless? I love every bit of Cherie, and I know she is somewhat connected as well.

Like this:

Are they really trying to convince us that not consuming Shezan’s (one of our largest manufacturers of edible things in Pakistan) products is of national interest because it’s owned by the Ahmadis?

Oh, come on!

Sure they come from a different set of thoughts, and believe Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Sahib to be a prophet and also believe in the Quran – which contradicts their ideology, as Allah says there will be no prophet after Muhammad (PBUH). But that’s ignorable, as we know that the real truth lies within the Quran and that anything/anyone that offers a different angle to this din is very misguided. Since it does not matter who said what, especially over Prophet Muhammad’s (PBUH) word, who himself said that my main sunnat/hadith is the holy Quran itself! But of course, the devil must twist someone’s mind down the lineage road and mislead many others who don’t want to act on clear instructions.
It is really mind-boggling how different sects declaring/believing in the same God, and book, re fighting against each other as if they were enlightened on the subject by some holy text. Many even would argue how Allah mentions that Muslims should fight their enemies have got to be followed in the most subtle meanings.
[Now viewpoints must change, and a comparison drawn up if we want to fair in judging the situation and their anger].

First, the Ahmadis: They believe in Islam, and call themselves Muslim. Just like Sunnis. But their religion changes course when they start believing that a guy named Mirza Ghulam Ahmad from India, who claimed that he had gotten revelations from the heavens on many occasions, or in other words, a Mujaddid, was the promised messiah (second coming of Jesus Christ). He was the founder of The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, which would follow his guidance and would somewhat be under his wing. Meanwhile, many of his community members even settled in Pakistan, where they were treated differently, and in many cases, abusively. Pakistan’s lower-middle and lower classes, especially, would treat Ahmadis in a different manner and in a very biased fashion. Some even condemning them to hell’s eternal fire, God’s wrath, and a general enemy to the more pure Muslim society of the Sunnis. (More detail on this here).

Now, the Sunnis: There isn’t much to where they come from, really. They are all believers in the basic and fundamental beliefs that Quran brought along with, nothing other than that – except some give importance to Prophet Muhammad’s (PBUH) more than his message, the Quran, which is absurd. But there is one major place where they are making a blunder in. Even though their concepts are noble, they have given more importance to the practices mentioned in the Quran (Salah, fasting, charity etc.), over it’s message (of human growth and welfare). This is more of a culture-like following, than a din (way of life/code of life).
So, understanding that both sides are slightly off their path of Din, we can say that both of them are at fault. Not so.

Allah says, in the holy Quran, that Muslims should fight their enemies. Enemy is a word given to people who purposefully is interfering with what you preach and have faith in. But at the same time, the very same God says, that everyone has a right to believe whatever they want, and there is no jabar (forceful action) in my Din. Now this just confuses our people, even when the message is oh-so obvious. The latter is to be applied at all times, and in daily life. The former, though, is to be taken action upon under more severe consequences.
But one thing that pushes the Ahmadis in the shadow is this: Mirza Ghulam Ahmad declared that Jesus (Isa) had in fact survived the crucifixion and later died a natural death after having migrated towards Kashmir, and that he had appeared in the spirit and power of Jesus.

Now, that’s just wrong and slightly pushing it.

We can agree on this, although, that no matter what they say, everyone has an equal right and freedom to believe and say what they want… Even if it’s wrong.

Also, this is against the law of consumerism and capitalism.

More detail on the situation of the banned juice:
This decision was launched by the Lahore Barrister Association, and voted in favor for by a hundred educated lawyers.

Like this:

Birth and death; we all move between these two unknowns. – Bryant H. McGill

A subscriber to real-time updates from Twitter, I get all the news and views on everything that goes through the minds of the people I follow. When I woke up this morning I had a lot of bed readingto wake up to. And today, unlike other days, everyone was tweeting about Whitney Houston.. And her unfortunate passing.

Her publicist reported that she was found dead, in the early hours of the morning, in her hotel room at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. She was to perform at a pre-Grammy show on Saturday, and then, also at the Grammys on Sunday. No one knows the cause of death, even now. Only 48, she was too young to leave so soon.
Here’s the introduction to her Wikipedia page:

Houston was the only artist to chart seven consecutive No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 hits (“Saving All My Love for You”, “How Will I Know”, “Greatest Love of All”, “I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)”, “Didn’t We Almost Have It All”, “So Emotional” and “Where Do Broken Hearts Go”). She was the second artist behind Elton John and the only female artist to have two number-one Top Billboard 200 Album awards (formerly “Top Pop Album”) on the Billboardmagazine year-end charts. Houston’s 1985 debut album Whitney Houston, became the best-selling debut album by a female act at the time of its release. The album was named Rolling Stone‘s best album of 1986, and was ranked at number 254 on Rolling Stone‘s list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.[7] Her second studio album Whitney (1987), became the first album by a female artist to debut at number one on the Billboard 200 albums chart.[7] Houston’s crossover appeal on the popular music charts as well as her prominence on MTV, starting with her video for “How Will I Know“,[8] influenced several African-American female artists to follow in her footsteps.[9][10]

On February 11, 2012, Houston died of unknown causes at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, California.[12]TMZ reported, “Sources tell us … when EMTs arrived Whitney’s body was already removed from the bathtub so it will take an autopsy to determine if she OD’d, drowned or died from some other cause.”[13]

Quotes:

I decided long ago never to walk in anyone’s shadow; if I fail, or if I succeed at least I did as I believe.

From the beginning, the camera and I were great friends. It loves me, and I love it.

I like being a woman, even in a man’s world. After all, men can’t wear dresses, but we can wear the pants.

My mother taught me that when you stand in the truth and someone tells a lie about you, don’t fight it.

When I heard Aretha, I could feel her emotional delivery so clearly. It came from down deep within. That’s what I wanted to do.

Like this:

A thing of beauty is a joy forever: its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness.

I have been astonished that men could die martyrs for religion – I have shuddered at it. I shudder no more – I could be martyred for my religion – Love is my religion – I could die for that.

Philosophy will clip an angel’s wings.

There is an electric fire in human nature tending to purify – so that among these human creatures there is continually some birth of new heroism. The pity is that we must wonder at it, as we should at finding a pearl in rubbish.

Keats was the mere soul of ‘cozy’ love, even though his life was anything but. With Valentine’s Day so near, and it’s spirit everywhere, I could not help but indulge myself in some pure romance from a man to a woman with no haste or hiccup.

Even contemplating the idea of making a post everyday from his collection of poems and letters to celebrate love. Quite tempting, indeed. After all, it’s such a beautiful feeling (even if animal, haha!).